Tag: Design

Continued from early waypoint tag concepts

The first play test dog was achieved with two researchers walking in tandem with the dog. This meant that one research was able to drop in the tags while the other walked with the dog. Adding waypoint tags to dogwalk is actually fairly cumbersome. The steps are: Open the app (it runs in the background); hit the map to open a pin drop dialogue box; type in the text.

The first walk did result in a rich set of data. The GPX file with its tag codes was run through excel to convert the codes to text so they could be read more easily. It was then viewed via Google Earth.

This is perhaps too many distinct tags for a single walker without a co-researcher walking along beside. Some of the proposed tags were not as useful as one might suppose (at least in the case of the specific companion animal). Sniff (S) for example was less of an event but more of an approach to the terrain on the part of the dog. This could be because the breed is a slightly famous ‘garbage guts’ and will seek potential food where ever it can and probably because the data collection itself slowed down the pace of the walk giving the companion animal time to sniff around a lot more. Tug (T) was also too vague. The Dog Wait (DW) tag didn’t seem viable as it was again, too vague and didn’t fit in with any actual recorded behaviour.

Refined waypoint tag set – colour selection based on distinct colour set based on Kenneth Kell’s 22 colours of maximum contrast.

Typical map backgrounds create issues for data visualisation clarity and limit potential colour use. The waypoint tag list is still a work in progress but we wanted to get an idea of what a data visualisation might reveal.

The first data visualisation animated mock-up. Waypoints scaled according to a rough estimate of time spent according to the GPX file.

To trace route or not to trace route?

A key concept in early discussions about potential design work was the importance of fore-fronting the experience over the autocracy of the line of the route. A potential visualisation concept was to show different activities as nodes and to indicate time spent engaging in the activity.

The concept here was that this would give us hotspots over a selection of walks which could be used as indicators of place-making.

While the typical line of the GPS app is too overt and flattens the record of experience, no route line disappears the nature of the journey. Both nodes and routes need to be visualised together.

Inspirations

Craig Taylor’s work is the inspiration for subsequent data visualisation work.

A key concept in the Pathways and Paws(es) design is reaching into the experience of the walk as a co-performing partnership between person and companion animal.

We are particularly engaged with the potential for physical place-based designs where the central design metaphor is daily life and emergent place-based community connectivity. If we are truly going to design for slowing down then considering physical place as a collaborative partner in the designing is essential. We are also enticed by the potential of the re-focus on the pauses (places) of the typical GPS tracking app. If we include the pauses that our dogs make during the walk then we are setting ourselves up for the next phase of the project which might look at constructing place-based tracking from the companion animal’s perspective. 

from Pathways & Paws(es) 2018

We started listing the kinds of experiences that both the walker and the companion animal might have in order to get a list of quick codes that we could use to annotate waypoints in dogwalk.

Some of these tags reflect very early design ideas. Attach lead (A) was intended to be an important tag because the notion was that this could later become a simple way of activating the GPS tracking and providing a start point for a geofence (e.g. tracking would actually start 50 metres after attaching the lead in order to avoid giving away personal information and a home address). Functional (F) seemed useful because it might encompass hurdles and barriers such as gates or crossing. Wait (W) was in a similar vein but purposed to the concept of using the app to reveal ‘broken’ pathways. For example a 10 minute wait to get across a busy road. The Viewing (V) tag was a kind of corollary to waiting, so stopping to admire or enjoy something during the walk. Chatting (C) refers to an actual exchange between the walker and other people and En Passant or Deviate (D) is an attempt to capture the we often walk passed others and acknowledge their presence by avoiding them or containing the dog. For example passing someone with a stroller who needs the space or passing someone who doesn’t wish the dogs to meet.

The waypoint tags for the dog in this list are again somewhat off the cuff. Wait (DW) was an idea that the dog might stop for its own reasons (perhaps durning an En Passant). Tug (T) encapsulated a need on the part of the dog to investigate something, that sudden veering towards a particularly interesting smell. Sniff (S) was intended to actually capture the dog’s smelling activity, Roll (R) is an extension of this as most of the exuberant dog rolling takes place on the more interesting smells. Greet (G) refers to the friendly dog to dog exchanges.

Wee (1) and Poo (2) are obvious animal business but also from the dog’s perspective often important recognition of other dogs passing in the same place. Scent marking is an instinctual behavior in which a dog deposits their own odor — in the form of urine or feces — onto the environment to mark territory or make a statement. Other dogs who come upon the scent can discern a lot about fellow canines in the neighborhood. Apparently they also orient themselves against the earth’s magnetic field.

Next: Evolving the waypoint tags